1. Field of the Invention (Technical Field):
The present invention relates generally to evaporation of liquids and more particularly to evaporative incineration of wastewater.
2. Description of Related Art:
Evaporative wastewater incineration is a process useful for the disposal of wastewater.
In the past few decades, the oil and gas production industry has sought to develop a system that can dispose of the produced wastewater on site without success. This lack of success has primarily been because the systems tested so far were attempting to heat up all the water in a holding pit to evaporate it. These systems could not evaporate all the wastewater in the pit and were producing water vapor with hydrocarbon pollutants in it.
Embodiments of the present invention solve this problem by evaporating only a small portion of the liquid in a storage container at a time. This predetermined volume downsizing is preferably accomplished through metering systems. Embodiments of the present invention use energy that is available on site, and which may otherwise be wasted; reduce carbon footprint in conjunction with the evaporation of wastewater by incinerating hydrocarbon pollutants in the water and the exhaust of internal combustion compressor engines; and produce byproducts that are marketable.